The New World of Islam

and morals were alike execrable. The last vestiges of Saracenic culture had vanished in a barbarous luxury of the few and an equally barbarous degradation of the multitude. Learning was

, like their masters', on tyranny and extortion. The pashas, in turn, strove ceaselessly against unruly local chiefs and swarms of brigands who infested the countryside. Beneath this sinister hierarchy groaned the pe

oly men," worshipped as saints and "intercessors" with that Allah who had become too remote a being for the direct devotion of these benighted souls. As for the moral precepts of the Koran, they were ignored or defied. Wine-drinking and opium-eating were well-nigh universal, prostitution was rampant, and the most degrading vices flaunted naked and unashamed. Even the holy cities, Mecca and

o the true path. This puritan reformer, the famous Abd-el-Wahab, kindled a fire which presently spread to the remotest corners

hirst, where the rash invader was lured to sudden death in a whirl of stabbing spears. The Arabs recognized no master, wandering at will with their flocks and camels, or settled here and there in green oases hidden in the desert's heart. And in the desert they retained their primitive political and religious virtues. The nomad Bedouin lived under the sway of patriarchal "sheiks"; the settled dwellers in the oases usually acknowledged the authority of some leading family. But these rulers possessed the slenderest a

onverted Mahommed, head of the great clan of Saud, the most powerful chieftain in all the Nejd. This gave Abd-el-Wahab both moral prestige and material strength, and he made the most of his opportunities. Gradually, the desert Arabs were welded into a politico-religious unity like that effected by the Prophet. Abd-el-Wahab was, in truth, a faithful counterpart of the first caliphs, Abu Bekr and Omar. When he died in 1787 his disciple, Saud, proved a worthy successor. The new Wahabi sta

years of the nineteenth century. Nothing could stand against the rush of the Wahabi hosts burning with fanatic hatred against the Turks, who were loathed both as apostate Moslems and as usurpers of that supremacy in I

numerous European officers who rapidly fashioned a formidable army, composed largely of hard-fighting Albanian highlanders, and disciplined and equipped after European models. Mehemet Ali gladly answered the Sultan's summons, and it soon became clear that even Wahabi fanati

th prevented a possible Wahabi conquest of northern India. This state was shattered by the Sikhs, about 1830, but when the English conquered the country they had infinite trouble with the smouldering embers of Wahabi feeling, which, in fact, lived on, contributed to the Indian mutiny, and permanently fanaticized Afghanistan and the wild tribes of the Indian North-West Frontier.[7] It was during these years that the famous Seyid Mahommed ben Sennussi came from his Algerian home to Mecca and there imbibed those Wahabi principles which led to the founding of the great Pan-Islamic fraternity that bears his name. E

ng simplicity, and the Koran, literally interpreted, was taken as the sole guide for human action. This doctrinal simplification was accompanied by a most rigid code of morals. The prayers, fastings, and other practices enjoined by Mohammed were scrupulously observed. The most austere manner of living was enforced. Silken clothing, rich food, wine, opium, tobacco, coffee, and all other indulgences were sternly pr

us reformation is an uncritical return to the primitive cult. To the religious reformer the only way of salvation is a denial of all subsequent innovations, regardless of their character. Our own Protestant Reformation began in just this

y of Motazelism had faded away. Now, however, those memories were revived, and the liberal-minded reformers were delighted to find such striking confirmation of their ideas, both in the writings of the Motazelite doctors and in the sacred texts themselves. The principle that reason and not blind prescription was to be the test opened the door to the possibility of all those reforms which they had most at heart. For example, the reformers found that in the traditional writings Moham

progressive adaptation to the expansion of human knowledge. Such is the contention not only of Christian polemicists,[10] but also of rationalists like Renan and European administrators of Moslem population

ith Moslems, deserve respectful consideration. And yet an historical survey of religions, and especially a survey of t

n progress and civilization. But was not precisely the same thing true of Christendom at the beginning of the fifteenth century? Compare the sheriat with the Christian canon law. The spirit is the same. Take, for example, the sheriat's prohibition on the lending of money at interest; a prohibition which, if obeyed, renders impossible anything like business or industry in the modern sense. This is the example oftenest cited to prove Islam's innate incompatibility with modern civilization. But the Christian canon law equally forbade interest, and enforced that prohibition so strictly, tha

nowledge. His own words are eloquent testi

n, if need be, on th

from the cradl

of more value than the rec

more precious than

mmunicated to a Moslem brother, out

he successors o

d nothing bette

grimage, and all other good works; nevertheless, he shall be r

adapted to that progress by being reformed and liberalized. No human society once fairly on the march was ever turned back by a creed. Halted it may be, but if the progressive urge persists, the doctrinal barrier is either surmounted, undermined, flanked, or swept aside. Now there is no possibility that the Moslem world will henceforth lack progressive influences. It is in close contact with Western civilization, and is being increasingly permeated with Western ideas. Islam cannot break away and isolate itself if it would. Everything therefore portends its profo

heir words and deeds; since, as one of their number, an Algerian, very pertinently remarks, "me

age."[14] These isolated voices from Islam's Dark Time helped to encourage the modern reformers, and by the middle of the nineteenth century every Moslem land had its group of forward-looking men. At first their numbers were, of course, insignificant, and of course they drew down upon themselves the anathemas of the fanatic Mollahs[15] and the hatred of the ignorant multitude. The first country where the reformers made their influence definitely felt was in India. Here a group headed by the famous Sir Syed Ahmed Khan started an important liberal movement, founding associations, publishing books and newspapers, and establishing the well-kn

huda Bukhsh. "Nothing was more distant from the Prophet's thought," he writes, "than to fetter the mind or to lay down fixed, immutable, unchanging laws for his followers. The Quran is a book of guidance to the faithful, and not an obstacle in the path, of their social, moral, legal, and intellectual progress." He laments Islam's present backwardness, for he continues: "Modern Islam, with its hierarchy of priesthood, gross fanaticism, appalli

ha made earnest though unavailing efforts to liberalize and modernize the Ottoman Empire. Even the dreadful Hamidian tyranny could not kill Turkish liberalism. It went underground or into exile, and in 1908 put through the revolution which deposed the tyrant and brought the "Young Turks" to

the best sense of the word conservatives, receptive to healthy change, yet maintaining their hereditary poise. Sincerely re

neered, who have drifted into an attitude varying from easygoing religious indifference to avowed agnosticism. From their minds the old Moslem zeal has entirely departed. The Algerian Ismael Hamet well describes the attitude of this class of his fellow-countrymen when he writes: "European scepticism is not without influence upon the Algerian Moslems, who, if they have kept some attachme

exploiters) of the ignorant masses, the radicals hunger for political power and rage against that Western domination which vetoes their ambitious pretensions. Hence, they are mostly extreme "Nationalists," while they are also deep in Pan-Islamic reactionary schemes. Indeed, we often witness the strange spectacle of atheists posing as Moslem fanatics and affecting a truly dervish zeal. Mr. Bukhsh well describes this type when he write

bservers, that a Christian, whatever his position, by the mere fact that he is a Christian, is in our eyes a being devoid of all human dignity. Our reasoning is simple and definitive. We say: the man whose judgment is so perverted as to deny the evidence of the One God and to fabricate gods of different kinds, cannot be other than the most ignoble expression of human stupidity. To speak to him would be a humiliation to our reason and an offence to the grandeur of the Master of the Universe. The worshipper of false gods is a monster of ingratitude; he is the execration of the universe; to combat him, convert him, or annihilate him is the holiest t

es for us by your own means, you yourselves have rekindled the inextinguishable faith of our heroic martyrs. Our Young Turks, our Babis, our new frat

d in admiration of their own world, which they regard as the highest ideal of human existence, and fanatically hating everything outside as wicked, despicable, and deceptive. Even when compelled to admit the superior power of the West, they hate it none the less. They rebel blindly against the spirit of ch

s being continually permeated by Western progress and must continue to be thus permeated unless Western civilization itself collapses in ruin. Yet, though the ultimate triumph of the liberals appears probable, what delays, what setbacks

nce and are convinced that a thoroughgoing reformation along liberal, progressive lines is at once a practical necessity and a sacred duty. Exactly how this reformation shall be legally effected has not yet been det

different from the Moslem world of a century ago. The Wahabi leaven has destroyed abuses and has rekindled a purer religious faith. Even its fanatical zeal has not be

TNO

astern Questions (London, 1872); D. B. Macdonald, Muslim Theology (London, 1903); J. L. Burckhardt, Notes on the Bedouins

Ahmed of Aligarh, the Indian Moslem l

ndian Moslems, down through the middle of the nineteenth cent

Comte Arthur de Gobineau, Trois Ans en Perse (Paris, 1867). A good summary of all

-el-Masabih

abs; especially his Arabia, the Cradle of Islam (Edinburgh, 1900), and The Reproach of Islam (London, 1915). Also see volume entitled The

(London, 1908). For Renan's attitude, see

the ye

sulmans fran?ais du Nord

rron in his work L'Is

or caste, as is the case in Christianity, Judaism, Brahmanism, and other religions. Theoretically any Moslem can conduct religious services. As time passed, however, a class of men developed who were learned in Moslem theol

ale, Vol. XII., p. 498. This article gives an excellent general survey of

-known book, The Spirit

s: Indian and Islamic, pp.

856 to

ssian Tartars, see Arminius Vambéry, Weste

mans fran?ais du Nord de l'A

Bukhsh, op.

heroutiette, of August, 1921. Quoted from A. Servier,

Islamisme (Paris, 1877); H. N. Brailsford "Modernism in Islam," The Fortnightly Review, September, 1908; Sir Theodore Morison, "Can Islam be Reformed?" The Nineteenth Centur